Vale Beakie - everything a teacher should be

We do not value our teachers as we should, but without them we and our children are nothing. I was fortunate to have a great man as my Sixth Class teacher and couldn't let his death pass without tribute, writes Mike Carlton.

My old Sixth Class teacher died the other day. A fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy, he went out as he had lived, in bravura style.

One of his sons reported that he cracked jokes with the ambulance paramedics who drove him from his nursing home to the hospital at Coolangatta on the NSW-Queensland border, where heart failure finally felled him at the age of 91.

John Morris was his name and, yes, he would have enjoyed the quote from Hamlet. He was a fine teacher, the best I ever had, a man who crackled and fizzed and sparkled and inspired, in the classroom and out.

My father had died when I was five, so I guess he was in many ways a surrogate presence in my life. He rejoiced - and I mean rejoiced - in the nickname "Beakie", a schoolboy tribute to a nose so grand, so awesomely prominent, that it preceded its owner around corners and may well have required him to tack in a strong wind like a yacht. He would have chortled at that idea, too.

Beakie was born to a battling family in the downtrodden London suburb of Hackney in 1923. As a boy he was sent from the house to collect manure from passing draught horses, and he developed a lifelong loathing for the English class system. He escaped that crushing burden by emigrating to Australia after World War II, a decision he exulted in all his life.

Yet, paradoxically, this enemy of snobbery and privilege and staunch atheist to boot found work teaching the sons of gentlemen in two of the nation's poshest private schools: The Anglican Church's Barker College at Hornsby north of Sydney, and later at the Sydney Grammar preparatory school. I imagine he regarded it as missionary work of a sort, a vocation to rescue 11-year-old boys from the wretched excesses of the haut bourgeoisie.

He taught me at Barker. In 1957 he led me towards what Winston Churchill once notably described as "the structure of the ordinary British sentence ... a noble thing."

Passionate about good writing, he urged and pleaded and cajoled to get it, heaped praise when he found it, and encouragement when he did not. I remember him explaining the word "cliché" to me, the first time I had heard it. I loved him for this, not least because he put me in the way of a career and a good and happy living.

Always the stirrer, he flick-passed the conventions and at the end of the year binned the usual turgid school boy dramatic stuff to write satirical sketches for us to perform at the Christmas concert. My role in the atrocity was to sing a famous cigarette advertising jingle of the day.

"Light up a Viscount," I trilled in a boyish treble. On stage behind me, a giant portrait of Field Marshal Viscount Montgomery, the victor of Alamein, went up in flames. The headmaster and the stuffier parents were incandescent at this wickedness. Beakie was publicly contrite - to a point - but we shared a private laugh for weeks. Looking back, this might have been my first intimation that authority with a capital A was not all-knowing and to be blindly obeyed; a useful lesson.

In truth, Beakie loved a show, a spectacle, a circus, a blast of personal publicity. With an eye on riches beyond teaching, he became a contestant on the TV quiz shows that were all the rage in the '60s, '70s and '80s - Bob Dyer's Pick a Box, Tony Barber's Sale of the Century, I've Got a Secret and Great Temptation. Gifted with a self-taught general knowledge, he made money and retired on it, a decision he later came to regret.

We kept in loose contact over the years. He was kind enough to follow my media career. I knew him as a fervent opponent of the Vietnam War, a man of small "l" liberal politics, I guess, and - in later life - a doughty advocate for voluntary euthanasia.

A few years ago he wrote an elegant letter to The Sydney Morning Herald proclaiming the right of the aged and terminally ill to leave this life with dignity.

Fearing the onset of Alzheimer's or some other disaster of the elderly, he and his wife Julie determined they would "sweetly die", as he put it, "arms entwined, drinking a farewell glass of wine to a Bach cantata".

It didn't happen that way. The beloved Julie died some years before him, a shattering blow. He lingered on to rage against the dying of the light. The night before he went he asked anxiously that his poetry be not forgotten, but his last wish was that there should be no funeral. He left his body to science.

I have to say his death cut me up far more than I had expected. Which is why I am writing this. John "Beakie" Morris was a great man. There will be hundreds, if not thousands, of mourners besides me.

We do not value our teachers as we should, but without them we and our children are nothing.

Mike Carlton is a media commentator and author. View his full profile here.

Comments (47)

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Professor Rosseforp:

11 Dec 2014 3:30:10pm

"We do not value our teachers as we should, but without them we and our children are nothing" -- you obviously valued your teacher highly, and I certainly value many of mine highly.Without them we would be different people, but not "nothing", nor are our children.

Professor Rosseforp:

Henry the Moose:

The statement is not repeated twice. The author concludes with the phrase, whilst its first appearance below the heading is clearly an article summary placed there by The Drum.

This is evident from its use of the third person to describe the author who elsewhere only uses the personal pronoun, and the fact it is in bold type.

The phrase is obviously intended to be a turn-of-phrase to reinforce the author's view that teachers are immensely important, not a metaphysical statement. It is no different from a man saying, in a romantic mood, of his wife, "I am nothing without you". Or, "Nothing matters more than human rights".

Of course, things matter more on a metaphysical or existential level. Universal physical constants for example, the initial creative energies that formed the galaxies, or the simple act of being born. But speakers of English are not required to distinguish between these two frames of reference; a normal person knows what is meant, and only the philosophers amongst must definite their exalted terms.

Professor Rosseforp:

Heartlight:

12 Dec 2014 8:25:25am

Well, this teacher suggests that more correctly, if it was repeated, you should perhaps have said "repeated once", since the first iteration was not a repeat.However, it would be accurate to say "repeated twice" if it was, to make it clear that it had not been repeated three, four, or nine thousand six hundred and eleven times.

firthy:

Di Motton:

Ann:

11 Dec 2014 7:26:32pm

Yes, it was a very meaningful tribute, despite quibbles about semantics.

It is noteworthy not just for the sake of this particular teacher's accomplishments in educating students but in encouraging the concept that teachers should be eulogised, their funerals attended, their students crediting them for the education in their lives.

EM Laidly:

Artful Dodger:

11 Dec 2014 3:57:21pm

'We do not value our teachers as we should but without them we and our children are nothing"

So true Mike and that lack of value is the worst aspect of our system of education.I well remember a teacher I had in the far off land of my birth who instilled in me a love of learning- not for money or position but for its own sake.Years of war, deprivation and poverty meant we were lucky to have any sort of a school let alone a private education.

But what Mr Zarb left us with was a yearning for learning. He opened our minds to all possibilities - he gave us the ability to think for ourselves. This in a country where hereditary prejudices of religion,class and position were ingrained in its DNA.

That country is now a much more open and tolerant society,I like to believe it is so because of the Mr Zarb's of this world.

Mike Carlton and I were indeed fortunate to have such teachers in our lives but you know I wager just about every kid does at some time- if only they and their parents knew it.

NAK:

get real:

11 Dec 2014 5:05:10pm

Mike,Everyone has their own experience and memory of school. I did not enjoy my schooling but gained a commonwealth scholarship despite the poor teaching and have since had a very rewarding career after gaining several primary and higher degrees. I think the old saying 'if you cannot do teach' applies in almost all circumstances. I cannot remember a single teacher but well remember their unfairness and illogical and painful and stupid punishments.GR

wizeowl:

12 Dec 2014 11:01:57am

How sad to only remember the poorer teachers you had! Did you not know that children often learn not because of, but IN SPITE OF, their teachers? i remember the best and the worst as no doubt does Mike Carlton - the colossal dragon who taught me piano and utterly traumatized me with her violence, both physical and mental and the brilliant, witty woman who taught literature and encouraged a love of learning of all kinds and the great value of civilized argument. as a teacher of some 32 years experience of all kinds of students - primary, secondary tertiary - I've seen all kinds of teachers and let me assure everyone who reads this - the vast majority are dedicated, highly competent professionals.Don't believe everything Mr. Pyne tells you! In my career, I've seen teachers blamed for everything that's gone wrong with the world, from bad table manners to nuclear melt-downs. It's so important that like M.C. we celebrate those people who taught us some very important skills that so many parents don't: working in a community, compassion, courtesy, the treasures to be unearthed from great minds.

don't believe the media:

11 Dec 2014 5:21:46pm

A moving tribute, Mike. And a reference as to where you may have picked up on some of your most valuable questioning of all things oppressive and unfair.I too had a fine year master, who's lasting lesson was that natural talent or inheritance is nothing. It is what you do to be better that counts.

jon:

11 Dec 2014 5:49:22pm

Nice Michael, I was also taught by Mr Morris, my father worked out that he probably played football against him in the slums of London, they got on well. You forgot to mention however how well Mr Morris did on Bob Dyer's Pick A Box!

Lucy:

adam bonner:

11 Dec 2014 6:32:26pm

A teacher should also strive to have the courage to practise what he preaches. Ending one's life with dignity and at a time of one's choosing requires courage and an act. Leaving it until it is too late because of old age and inertia does not display either. Vale Beakie sounds like a great teacher and his irreverence for authority is sadly missing in many today. I only hope that his last wish is honoured but fear it will not be. We live in a society that believes group mourning is a higher priority than the wishes of the deceased. We dishonour the dead by applying our stereotypes to them.

Sly Place:

11 Dec 2014 6:39:27pm

A great piece Mike Carlton, and so true. I learned my great history teacher, Terry Buggy, died a few years ago and felt a similar sadness. Bob Philips, another history teacher of skill and talent plays on, for many years to come I hope.

JM:

11 Dec 2014 6:58:51pm

Well written Mike. A great teacher can make a magnificent difference to many lives. One of the problems we've been facing for the last 40 years or so has been the downgrading of teaching as a profession and at the same time eliminating the traditional teaching scholarships.It was those scholarships that enabled bright working class men and women (like Mr Morris) to be paid full apprentice wages while they studied. In return they committed to teach for a number of years.Once education began to be thought of as a purely private benefit and not a common good, it was easy to destroy this well established system of mutual support.

dan pink:

11 Dec 2014 9:00:59pm

JM. somehow I had forgotten this. Yes teaching scholarships would have made a big difference to a lot of people who otherwise could not have afforded to study. (However, paradoxically my spouse was offered a teachers college scholarship around 1965 but did not take it because she was paranoid that her parents would not have been able to afford to pay back the bond if she failed the course).

Astonished:

11 Dec 2014 7:10:26pm

Mike so well said. I had a history teacher in years 11 and 12. A real anti-establishment, rugby playing and rock band singing man in his 50s back in 77 and 78. He made us look at the world in a new light in the wake of EG Whitlam that the Left wasn't dead. He could inspire all in the class from the rabble to the studious students equally, without use of a blackboard. History to him was life and a great story to be told, not lectured. We were caught up in it and he inspired like Beakie. I often think that inspiring teachers set up ripples in lives that go way beyond the scope and length of their own.

Old Toff:

11 Dec 2014 7:46:10pm

Great memories of a great teacher I apparently sat in Carltons seat a bloke I had never heard of The thing was I never took up smoking as John told us that he had smoked the value of a Jaguar in his lifetime He also gave me a lifetime interest in trivia . When i was in sixth class he had just won the Valiant and venetian blinds on every window Vale a top man

Jody:

11 Dec 2014 10:21:19pm

I miss your insightful, brutally honest but above all intelligent commentary in the Herald, Mike. I very much agree with you here - I too had an amazing sixth grade teacher - Mrs Miller - whose teachings and experiences I remember with clarity, despite my terrible 50 year old memory.

OzinNam:

11 Dec 2014 10:25:06pm

Nice to you hear from you back from wherever you have been,Mike.

Having now spent a number of years in Asia, where teaching and education are in the highly reverent category, I can't but surmise that Australia'a (lack of) attitude to both will cost us dearly in the future.

I attendned Normanhurst Boys' High from 1967-1972. I had French and Latin teachers named Mr Bambrick and Mrs Nicholls who taught me what language is all about and I remain eternally grateful to them as in later years I became a language teacher myself..simply not valued in Australia.

Murk:

11 Dec 2014 11:50:36pm

I had the good fortune to meet one of my mentoring teachers GAC several years after leaving school. It was a dark evening near our work carpark. After exchanging pleasantries I thanked GAC for giving me a love of music and books. 'Do you mean, Murk, my life hasn't been in vain?!' With that comment he walked off. We heard that many years later he was pushed into early retirement by a 'new ideas' Principal.

martin beach:

12 Dec 2014 2:56:16am

I found this story very moving, and as a Christian, am heartened that God uses atheists to help shape people's thinking. Not so sure that euthanasia is such a good idea though. Suffering is by no means pleasant but it teaches us to see things in a different light, and to better appreciate the more important things in life, and these things can be taught to others. Euthanasia deprives others of this learning opportunity.

One of my mentors was a US navy serviceman in the immediate postwar (II) period. He & his shipmates were exposed to severe radiation from nuclear testing around the Marshall Islands & other places. Most of his shipmates had died by the 1970's, but he survived until 2002. I was one of many who benefited from his teaching; had he refused his gift of life (albeit wracked with pain, particularly in the later years), we'd have missed the opportunity of this learning.

Life is a gift from God; the Lord gives & the Lord takes away, blessed be the name of the Lord. (Job was able to say this in spite of the death of his children & the loss of all his property, all he had left were his nagging wife [Why don't you curse God & die?] & self righteous friends.)

I'm happy to hear Beakie didn't feel the need to prematurely 'pull the plug' in spite of his miseries & support for the principle of euthanasia. I'm tempted to add that euthanasia is fit only for animals, and point to the young Pakistani woman (Malala?) who could've thrown in the towel quite easily, but has since proven to be a great tower of strength for many around the world. Let's hear it for Beakie & all others who choose to be mentors rather than tormentors.

ardy:

Aspidistra kid:

12 Dec 2014 6:24:04am

Just once in a while the human race produces a gem that seems to redeem the whole tribe. I remember John Morris from Pick a Box. It seemed remarkable that someone with all that knowledge could be so radiantly good humoured. You have explained the source of that determination, but it is still a marvel.Mike, as ever, your writing cheers me up, fortifies my convictions, and gives me heart.

Christine :

12 Dec 2014 7:57:41am

I tend to agree. A person with no moral judgement or character is nothing. Someone that the children can aspire to and look up to is really something. And how children feel about themselves at the end of the day that is everything. Without some sort of self esteem, this journey we call life is just not with it! This is too evident these days when I see people opting for the rat race!

Dodgy Knees:

12 Dec 2014 8:55:01am

Welcome back Mike, all is forgiven, even if it was never committed as claimed

Up in in bush of North Qld in the 50's & 60's I probably experienced 25 or so teachers. In my view the first was the best - my motherA child of the depression and still at bat at 101, she instilled my love of learning and language with stories and song from the time I started annoying everyone with questions. She enrolled me in the book mailing service of the Queensland State Library and I voraciously gorged on 4 books a week.

I remember my primary school teachers, but mostly for their skills with the cane. At High School an excellent History teacher ( Ms Kriesel )encouraged independent questioning of matters political. In 1963 she was arguing against the Menzonian rant that Red China and Russia were at our door in a combined Communist Domino. She pointed out frequent border clashes and differences in doctrines indicated they were not joined at the hip, even though they had a convenient common enemy.

Over in English at Ingham High, a young Millicent Poole ( now a retired Professor from Cowan University ) extolled the language of old Bill S, even though I felt she was somewhat embarrassed by the " nunnery " reference in Hamlet

Steven Lewis:

12 Dec 2014 9:07:04am

Mr Morris was my sixth class teacher at Sydney Grammar. In all my years at school and university there was none as exciting and motivating as Mr Morris. His quest for knowledge was contagious and we happily allowed his enthusiasm to motivate us to learn ever more. His humour was uplifting. The liberal arts live on in his memory.

DA:

12 Dec 2014 10:01:28am

I was fortunate enough to have been in John Morris?s class for his last year at Barker in1967. I don?t agree with Mike Carlton?s opinions very often, however he is spot on in regards to this great teacher.

I remember his enthusiasm, humour, mesmerising teaching style as it was yesterday. The breadth of subjects we covered for 6th class was astounding ? The American Civil War, the Russian Revolution, The American War of Independence. The Australian system of Government including a breakdown of the budget. Then there was the constant testing. This was not feared, but seen as a way to measure ourselves and compete against our fellow classmates.

He often brought in slides from his travels around the world, with each one a different story, imploring us to travel to broaden our outlook.

1967 just flew past, there was never a dull moment. This was the only year in my schooling where the school holidays were not looked forward to. I feel immensely privileged to have been taught by this wonderful man.

Supertaff:

Bea:

12 Dec 2014 12:37:49pm

Thank you Mike, I learned more about wonderful and witty Johnny again reading your words.I was blessed to meet him in his last 3 years, taught some Back Gammon ("Do you REALLY want to make this move??") impressed with his speaking German with me so fluently after not having been there for 50 plus years and us getting teary together over German songs most Germans wouldn't know. Whenever I visited, I left with red cheeks as he always had a compliment for the 'pretty girl' and with a new joke or phrase he had pulled out of the depths of his conscience, which at 91 still held more than mine ever will.Happy travels Johnny, I will miss you and you got what you wanted, join with Julie without the horrors of a slow death.All my loveBea